10 November 1998
The Holy Priests
of the Holy Diocese of Denver
Beloved in the Lord,
It has come to my attention that on particular feast days and fast days the commemoration of the event during Orthros in the prayer, "Save, God, Your people and bless Your inheritance; visit your world with mercy ...," as well as in the dismissal is placed at the end of the commemoration where it does not belong.
When the commemoration or event has to do with the Lord, the Ever-virgin Mary, Saint John the Baptist, the Holy Cross, and the Angelic powers, the commemoration is not done at the end, but where the saint is mentioned in the litany of names. In other words, when it is the Dormition of the Virgin Mary or the Elevation of the Holy Cross, or the Synaxis of Saint John the Baptist or the Archangels, the commemoration is made exactly where the name is mentioned.
For example:
"May Christ our true God (Who is risen from the dead), through the intercessions of ...
a. ... His all-pure and all-blameless Mother whose Dormition we celebrate this day ...
b. ... by the power of the precious and life-giving Cross whose Universal Exaltation we celebrate this day ...
c. ... through the protection of the heavenly bodiless powers whose Synaxis we celebrate this day ...
d. ... through the supplications of the honorable, glorious, prophet, forerunner and baptist John whose beheading we commemorate this day ...
... of the holy and all-praiseworthy Apostles; of the holy, glorious and triumphant martyrs; of our venerable and God-bearing fathers; of (the patron saint); of the holy and righteous ancestors of God, Joachim and Anna; ... etc."
Allow me further to say that some brother priests must improve their diction. They should speak or chant more slowly and with greater clarity, especially if they are using a public address system. Some of these systems tend to distort the words of the priest because they appear to the listener of running together.
For a priest to give a sermon and for the people not to comprehend what he is saying is a waste of time both for the priest and his congregation.
I ask all of you to be more careful in how you celebrate the various services and sacraments.
With Paternal Blessings,
+Metropolitan Isaiah
Presiding Hierarch
of
the Diocese of Denver